


Fall

by AN12



Category: Vermintide, Warhammer Fantasy
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Friendship, Gen, Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 05:48:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30034017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AN12/pseuds/AN12
Summary: “Ah, the sound of flogging in the morning. This brings back fond memories, doesn’t it, Brother Victor?”Victor inclined his head slightly in greeting. The speaker, an older man with sharp, clever eyes, had just emerged from the main front doors behind him.“Brother Kraussman. Unfortunately, the standard for trainees every year seems to be slipping.”In the mission The Blightreaper, Saltzpyre mentions that he knows Father Kraussman. This story briefly explores their past, and how duty sometimes exacts a harsh price.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7





	Fall

The sharp crack of a thin wooden cane striking across the back of a young apprentice resounded across the courtyard. Howling, the boy slumped forward in his restraints, his back a bloody mess of raw stripes.

Arms crossed, Victor looked on from the portico that adjoined the courtyard and the front doors of the chapter house. The young fool, no more than fifteen or sixteen, was being flogged for flouting the rules. He had been seen in dalliance with a girl, where he promptly forgot his brain and took to loud and careless boasting of his duties in the Order.

“Ah, the sound of flogging in the morning. This brings back fond memories, doesn’t it, Brother Victor?” 

Victor inclined his head slightly in greeting. The speaker, an older man with sharp, clever eyes, had just emerged from the main front doors behind him. 

“Brother Kraussman. Unfortunately, the standard for trainees every year seems to be slipping.”

Turning his head, he barked sharply at one of the nervous novices sweeping the flagstones. “You missed that spot there, and this one. Look at the filth covering them. Sloppy work! You had better get your back to it, boy, or I will inform the Captain of your laziness!”

The wretched boy saluted, scurrying to sweep the offending stones. The rest of the novices hastily withdrew to a respectable distance away from the two Witch Hunters, not willing to draw Victor’s attention and ire.

Kraussman chuckled, clasping his black-gloved hands behind his back. His eyes were like chips of blue ice beneath the broad brim of his watchtower hat. Although he was of stockier build and stood a head shorter than Victor, Kraussman was no less intimidating in his presence. Deep shadows hovered below his eyes, and the lines on his sallow face made him look far older and weathered beyond his forty-five years of age. 

“Hard as ever, I see. You have not changed a bit from our apprenticeship days.” 

“An ill-disciplined mind leads only to ruin,” said Victor, shrugging his shoulders. He looked at the other Witch Hunter with dry amusement. “And you of all people know that as well as I. It’s better that these soft trainees learn this now, than to have their entrails torn out by some Slaaneshi cultist in future.”

“Indeed,” returned the other man. He absently rubbed at his right arm, as though soothing some phantom pain. 

“If they lack the strength of will, then perhaps fear will save their lives instead,” continued Victor. He resumed staring emotionlessly at the young man screaming in the courtyard. At least there was a meaning here, a logic behind the harsh punishments. It was far better than being at the brunt of a drunkard’s angry blows, where there was no rhyme or reason to pain, except to be reminded each time that he deserved it.

Kraussman was speaking again. With an effort, Victor pulled himself back to the present.

“You have been on the field for what, two decades now? And from what I hear, your results have been nothing short of exemplary. I heard rumours that you may be up for a promotion soon.”

Victor smiled thinly, but his heart swelled with pride. “If Sigmar wills it. If my next assignment to Skaggerdorf is successful, then perhaps the Grand Theogonist will grace me with my own chapter house.” 

As a blacksmith’s son, who had nothing but raw talent and tenacity to commend him, it was a source of pride for Victor that he managed to distinguish himself among his more illustrious peers. Of course, he had to work thrice as hard, but that was usual when one did not possess a silver tongue or the political lineage of the Kriegers or Klausners.

“I have no doubt you will achieve it, Brother. Even among us aspirants, you have always been the most zealous.”

“Zealous, maybe,” Victor remarked dryly. He gave the other man a significant look.

“Well, that has always been the way of things for us with commoner blood,” Kraussman said, immediately understanding what was unspoken. “Take heart. You are the closest of our cohort to finally make it to Captain.”

He laid a gloved hand on a worn wooden pillar, staring out almost wistfully at the courtyard and its surroundings. The trees had just begun to shed their leaves of gold and scarlet, and the smell of the damp, loamy earth was heavy in the air. 

“It seems only yesterday that we were young boys, waiting here in this very courtyard for our first initiation.” His body gave a strange shiver that did not go unnoticed by Victor. “I wonder if we would have been so hasty to grow up, if we knew what horrors were waiting for us.”

“You seem to be in an odd mood this morning,” Victor said, staring at his friend in concern. “Are you all right?”

“Wilhelm is dead,” the other Witch Hunter said abruptly. “They found what was left of him in some overgrown field. A hedge witch killed him and… harvested him.”

Victor went very still. He clasped his hands behind his back, fingers white-knuckled beneath the leather gloves. In this cold and austere place, where he had suffered through an awkward adolescence, it was Wilhelm who first stretched his hand out to him in greeting.

“... I see. He was a good man,” he murmured softly, ignoring the numbness spreading through his body. “May Sigmar grant him peace in his next life. What about his widow?”

“Provided for of course. But the poor thing is distraught, as expected. There was hardly anything left of him for a funeral.”

“The funeral…?”

“Three days ago. I tried to reach you through the usual channels but you were undercover. But it’s fine, he would understand. We toil for the living, not the dead.”

Victor continued to stare ahead, his spine rigid and ramrod straight. There was nothing to say. 

“He is the third of our cohort to fall in two months,” muttered Kraussman bitterly. “All experienced Witch Hunters. The darkness has been growing ever more insidious. Every year, there are fewer of us, and our recruits are still too green.”

“Brother!” Victor admonished in a low voice, turning his head to glare a warning at the other man. “This is not the place to discuss such things.” 

“Do you remember Dietrich? Johan?” Kraussman continued as though he did not hear Victor. “Dietrich had a voice that could make angels weep in rapture. They found him tortured to death in some unmarked hovel. And Johan, his nose always in a book, always dreaming of being a scholar. He was gifted, but we all knew that he should never have become a Witch Hunter. He was sliced in half by a necromancer’s puppet.”

“They have done their duty, and we should rejoice that their souls are now in Sigmar’s care,” Victor said in a loud voice, looking around for prying ears and eyes. Thankfully, it was quiet now, with the novices at their lessons, and the whipped boy sent to the infirmary. His voice dropped to an urgent whisper. “Kraussman, have you gone mad?”

The older Witch Hunter laughed, the sound hollow and empty. Victor stared at him with growing dread.

“Aren’t we all, Brother Victor,” Kraussman said, his thin lips stretching in a crooked smile that did not reach his eyes. “I am old and weary, and have seen enough of the horrors and depravity that plague this world.” He pulled at his right arm again. 

“What are you saying?” Victor said slowly. 

“I have resigned from the Order. I have just handed in my commission, and once I surrender this wretched attire, I will be free.” Kraussman laid a hand on Victor’s shoulder. “I am sorry.”

Enraged, Victor brushed off his hand with a snarl. “I cannot accept this. You are no coward, so why? You cannot do this. You know how much I… we still have need of you! Sigmar’s subjects need you!”

The silence between them stretched taut like a bowstring. Victor was breathing heavily, his face flushed and angry. Kraussman in turn had paled, and he crossed his burly arms against his chest.

“You said it yourself,” Victor spat. “The darkness has been growing ever more insidious. How can you turn your back now, when Sigmar needs you most? What about Wilhelm and all the others? Do you not care about their sacrifices?” 

“Who are you to lecture me about sacrifice, Victor?” Kraussman snapped, stiff and tight-lipped. “For nearly thirty years I have hunted unspeakable terrors in their lairs and crypts. I see their hideous faces ever in my dreams, and carry their wounds on my flesh. What did I do this for, if not out of love of our Lord Sigmar?”

“Then why-?”

The look of abject anguish and horror on Kraussman’s lined face caused Victor’s rebuke to die on his lips.

“Aren’t the trees beautiful in autumn?” Kraussman abruptly said, changing the subject. He turned back to look at the courtyard. “I have never really noticed it, but the leaves are such a riot of colour and life. Have you ever observed them?”

Victor stared at him, not trusting himself to speak. 

“Instead of bringing death, I want to bring life instead,” Kraussman continued. “I want to become a priest.” 

“You, a priest?” To cover up his shock, Victor’s words came out in a jeering disbelief. “What manner of congregation will accept one of us as a priest? Have you forgotten that our hands are stained with blood?”

“I can serve our Lord Sigmar in other ways. Surely you can be happy for me, my friend?”

Victor turned away. His jaw was clenched tight, and his grey eyes stared straight ahead, seeing nothing. He understood why Kraussman made his decision, but that did not make the pain of loss any lesser. The grief he already felt at the death of his friend seemed to expand, pressing like a weight upon his chest. One by one, the men that he had lived, trained and fought with were disappearing, leaving him alone to bear the weight of the living. 

Kraussman’s posture sagged at Victor’s cold response, but he pulled himself together. “I hoped that you would understand, but nevertheless, my mind is made up. I will be going to Bogenhafen. When you are finally promoted, come drop by the Göttenplatz and I will buy you a drink.” 

He raised his hand to grasp Victor’s shoulder again but paused, thinking better of it. Letting his arm fall to his side, Kraussman turned to leave. “Fare thee well, my brother. I hope that you don’t think too badly of me. When we next meet, I have hope it will be in happier circumstances.”

Victor could hear the other man’s retreating footsteps. A small part of him wanted to call out, to apologize and wish Kraussman well, but pride and anger hardened his heart and stilled his tongue. He felt as though he was standing in a barren field, looking out into a bleak wasteland. The number of people he truly trusted in the world could be counted in one hand, and today he lost two of them.

He should have told Kraussman that there was no beauty in autumn leaves; that they were all dead, soon to wither and fall like ash.

Weeks turned into months, months into seasons, and seasons into years. 

But Victor did not go to Bogenhafen. 

Skaggerdorf changed him, and with the loss of his eye he gained a new and burning obsession with the fabled ratmen. Never one for delicacy and tact, Victor’s zeal to hunt a myth was enough to mark him as a pariah. His name, previously spoken with esteem within the Order, soon became whispered with mockery and derision.

Victor eventually learned to curb his frankness on the subject, but the damage was done. His heart simmered with resentment, as year after year he was passed over for that long coveted promotion in favour of incompetents and sycophants. Until finally, as the days grew darker and the Order’s losses were too heavy to ignore, did he ascend to the rank of Captain. 

And while he did think of his old friend from time to time, there was always something more urgent, more pressing to attend to. When the Pactsworn menace was dealt with, Victor reassured himself, there would be plenty of time to visit and set things right.

Hence, it came as a shock to Victor when Lohner mentioned him in a mission briefing.

“Turns out our Bogenhafen problem's down to a Chaos runesword - the Blightreaper. The good news is that Father Kraussman has it under lock and key-”

“Did you say Kraussman?” Victor interrupted, his pulse quickening. Old memories began to percolate up from the depths of his mind.

“Why yes,” Lohner replied, looking at the Witch Hunter curiously. “Unique name eh? He’s one of the priests over at the Temple of Sigmar. He’s been there for years, but I heard that he was previously a Witch Hunter. That would explain his remarkable level of initiative and knowledge in our correspondence. Did you know him, Saltzpyre?”

“Yes,” Victor said shortly, clasping his hands tightly behind his back. “We have met.”

“And?” The innkeeper prompted. “What do you know of this fellow?”

“That he is one of the best. I’m not surprised that you find him capable.”

* * *

Morrsleib hung low and bloated in the darkened sky, casting its sickly green light over the land. 

“This is an ill-omened night for righteous work,” muttered Victor, tightly gripping his prayer beads. He stood at the prow of the ship, staring out into the swift-moving river towards the approaching town of Bogenhafen. To see the specter of that dark moon looming over the town caused a chill to run down his spine.

Instinctively, Victor found himself reciting a litany from the Deus Sigmar, as he and his brothers had done together so many years ago, as they faced down a horde of restless undead and their corrupt necromancer. It was on a grim night such as this, when the sorcerous moon waxed full in the sky, the very air congealed with dark magic and evil. 

His heart sank when the ship pulled into the silent dock, the rows of empty vessels creaking and bobbing in the shifting current. Bogenhafen relied heavily on river trade, and the harbour should always be a hive of activity at all hours of the day. 

Dark shadows floated in the greenish-black waters, and Victor knew that the pier was already choked with corpses.

“Make haste,” he hissed at his companions, leaping from the boat onto the bloodstained wooden dock. “Chaos has already tainted this town.” 

_I’m coming to you, Kraussman._ Victor straightened, his calloused fingers squeezing on the prayer beads, lips moving in a silent prayer. _Sigmar, let me not be too late._

Shoving his prayer beads deep into his pocket, Victor unsheathed his rapier and pulled out a sidearm with his other hand. His boots clumped on the dock as he strode forward, desperately searching for signs of life. 

Above the gentle lapping of waves, the wind carried the sound of something wet and squelching towards him. Green light from the baleful moon shone down, illuminating the silhouettes of two ratmen feasting on a body. Chittering with glee, their sharp teeth tore into flesh, worrying bone. With a hiss of rage, Victor closed the distance between them, slicing one of the rat’s head from its body while firing his pistol through the eye of the other. 

With faith and steel, he would cut open the path to his brother. 

As the Ubersreik Five fought their way through the sewers and into the town, Victor grew increasingly agitated. Another alley, another street, winding deeper into Bogenhafen and yet… and yet, there were only Rotbloods and Skaven and corpses.

“Why,” he snarled, glaring at the mutilated bodies of the dead townsfolk littered all around. “Does no one ever put up a fight?”

“Curse you,” he raged at his companions as he ran his sword through a rotblood berserker. The crazed barbarian gasped, blood frothing from his mouth as he toppled to the side. “Damn all of you! Keep up!” 

“What has gotten into you, Saltzpyre?” Sienna yelled back, hurling a fireball into the midst of a band of shrieking Skaven. “You do realize we are in danger of being surrounded, right? Why are you rushing ahead?”

“Let him be, Sienna.” Markus was beside her, swinging his heavy sword at the rats that managed to avoid the wizard’s flame. “He’s worried about Father Kraussman.”

“Really? So Saltzpyre actually does have a heart! That’s something new.”

Ignoring Sienna’s jibe, Victor hurried up the cobbled street to where the tall gates of the High Temple of Sigmar awaited. That was where Kraussman said that he would meet them-

“And of course, the mayfly priest is not where he said he would be,” sneered Kerillian. “Just wonderful. How are we going to get in now?”

“I know Kraussman,” the Witch Hunter spat. Grasping the bars, he rattled the locked gates in frustration. The blood-soaked street in front of the Temple was empty and deserted. “If he is not here, then there must be a good reason. And knowing him-”

He looked around at the adjacent walls, peering at the stones in the dim light. 

“What are you looking for, Grimgi?” Bardin asked.

“A message,” Victor answered shortly. Fear clipped his voice, and he fought to still the trembling in his fingers as he groped the rough wall. 

Finally, he found what he was looking for. A scrawl, writ in Skaven blood. Even after so many years, he recognized the crude slant of Kraussman’s handwriting. Despite his friend’s many talents, penmanship was not one of them. 

“Here it is,” Victor announced triumphantly. 

“Looks like chicken scratches to me, sir,” Markus said, scratching his head. “How do you even know how to read it? Is it some code only Witch Hunters know?”

“No, it’s something we came up with when we were boys,” Victor said absently, working to decipher the code. “Me, Kraussman and Wilhelm, we used to write secret notes all the time-”

Victor stopped abruptly, realizing that he had spoken too much. He could feel his ears heat beneath his hat. 

No one spoke for a while.

“Sir, if I may- how did Kraussman know that you were coming?” Markus asked, breaking the silence.

“I- I’m not sure. Perhaps Lohner told him,” the Witch Hunter said, ignoring the pang rising in his chest. “Enough talk, I know where he is now. There is a hidden room in a cellar close by. Let’s move!”

Victor’s heart thudded against his chest as he leapt down the stairs, two at a time. His black boots skidded on diseased vines and mush, the sweet stench of decay rising all around him. As he headed deeper into the cellar, the spreading corruption seemed to manifest even stronger.

“Kraussman! Kraussman!” The Witch Hunter shouted. “Answer me, damn you! Krauss-”

His name died on Victor’s lips as he rounded the last corner. 

He had finally come to the source of the trail of pulsating rot and putridness spreading from an entire wall. And at the very base of that wall, the stones nearly swallowed up by the vomit-pink mulch, slumped a man. Or rather, it was a thing that was once a man, so covered in the putrescence of melting flesh and overripe fruit. Bloated flies buzzed around him. Twisted boughs grew out of the man’s flesh, creeping along the corrupted wall. 

Victor fell to his knees in grief and despair, his sword clattering beside him. 

“Those Nurgle bastards,” Markus swore behind him. “But the poor man may not be Father Kraussman, sir.”

“It’s him,” Victor said softly. 

“But how do you know-”

“Are you blind, Kruber? Do you not see the keys to the Temple gates on the floor?” Victor’s voice was sharp with grief. “He must have thrown them before the… corruption was complete. It’s exactly like Kraussman to have that presence of mind.”

Picking up the jangling keys, the mercenary turned around. The rest of the Five were quiet behind them. “We will be just outside, sir. There might be some time before the next wave.”

“There is no need, Kruber,” the Witch Hunter said, getting up. His voice was emotionless. “There is no time. We must not allow the Blightreaper to fall into the hands of Chaos. We cannot allow Kraussman’s sacrifice to be in vain. The only thing I can do now is to release him from this indignity.”

Taking out the vial of holy water that he always kept on his person, Victor muttered the rites for purification and cleansing. 

Opening the vial, Victor poured the consecrated water reverently over Kraussman’s tortured body. The drops smoked where they landed, and the contorted vines growing out of him writhed as though they were in agony. 

“Fuegonasus, if… if you please.”

“Of course, Victor,” Sienna said gently. A fireball bloomed above her outstretched palm. 

“Kraussman, I consign your body to the purifying flame,” Victor intoned, closing his eyes and making the sign of the hammer. “I free you from the clutches of Nurgle and all his loathsome ilk, from the evil and corruption of this world that you may find peace in the next. May Sigmar’s light always shine on you, my brother.” 

Nodding at Sienna, the Witch Hunter stepped back as she set the body aflame. 

“Let us go,” Victor said, stooping to pick up his sword. “There is nothing else we can do for him.”

And as he turned away, he could not help but remember the autumn of their parting. So many years had passed, so many things had changed, but yet the cycle of seasons remained the same: eternal and immutable. 

Before winter laid its final veil on him, Victor hoped that Kraussman had found the peace that he was searching for. 

It was too late now for regrets, but Victor wished that just once, in the ten years where they did not see each other, he had taken the time to visit Kraussman in Bogenhafen. They might have strolled along the bustling port, soaking in the sights and smells of the busy market, reminiscing about the past. It never occurred to Victor that he might outlive Kraussman, that the corruption of Chaos could spread so far within the Empire’s body. 

As he slashed his way to the Blightreaper, his eye burned with renewed fury and purpose. More than ever, he knew that he could never give up this fight. A price always had to be paid to fend off the darkness, and as long as he had strength, he would continue to pay it.

And pay it in full he would, as his brothers had done so before him. 


End file.
